Friday, December 29, 2006

You Can Mail Letters for Little or No Cost

I may never receive another piece of mail, but I have to let you in on a secret: It's possible tosend letters for free or for well below current postage rates. Information on beating the postalsystem has been floating around for decades, but it wasn't gathered in one place until outlawpublisher Loompanics put forth How To Screw the Post Office by "Mr. Unzip" in 2000.Not content to theorize from an ivory tower, Unzip put these methodsthrough the ultimate real-world test: He mailed letters. He alsoexamined the envelopes in which hundreds upon hundreds ofcustomers had paid their utility bills. Based on this, he offers proofthat letters with insufficient postage often make it to their destinations.The key is that the machines which scan for stamps work incrediblyfast, processing ten letters per second. They're also fairlyunsophisticated in their detection methods, relying mainly on stamps'glossy coating as a signal. Because of this, it's possible to successfullyuse lower-rate stamps, including outdated stamps, postcard stamps,and even 1-cent stamps. Beyond that, Unzip successfully sent lettersaffixed with only the perforated edges from a block of stamps. Even

those pseudostamps sent by charities like Easter Seals or environ-mental groups can fool thescanners.Another approach is to cut stamps in half, using each portion as full postage. Not only does thisgive you two stamps for the price of one, but you can often salvage the uncancelled portion ofstamps on letters you receive. In fact, the author shows that sometimes the Post Office processesstamps that have already been fully cancelled. This happens more often when the ink is light, buteven dark cancellation marks aren't necessarily a deal-breaker.Then there's the biggie, the Post Office's atomic secret that lets you mail letters for free. Sayyou're sending a letter to dear old mom. Simply put mom's address as the return address. Thenwrite your address in the center of the envelope, where you'd normally put hers. Forget about thestamp. The letter will be "returned" to her for insufficient postage.Unzip covers further techniques involving stamp positioning, metered mail, 2-cent stamps, andother tricks. Except perhaps for the reversed address scam, none of these tricks will guaranteeyour missive gets to its destination, so you wouldn't want to try them with important letters. Butif you want to save a few cents once in a while — or more likely, you want to have fun hackingthe postal system — it can be done.